As the OP I never meant to be a Canon vs Nikon rant, just to assess the veracity of owning the best of both worlds and whether it made sense business wise.

All I got was that people stick to their system even if it shot them in the foot... repeatedly. Brand loyalty does not make sense.

Well you chose the words "go Nikon" in your subject title on a Canon forum, what did you think would happen? its like going to the Republican convention and raising a question, about being a Democrat for a little while ... I guess free speech allows them to sing songs of praise and worship about Nikon, Sony or whatever sensor but it'd be more appropriate if they sang their glorious tunes in one of the Nikon, Sony forums that way they'll get people who will appreciate their songs of worship and praise

The common area on the first floor is illuminated by a skylight. The dark gray cell doors on the second level have no lighting on them at all. Exposing correctly for the highlights in this scene severly underexposes the doors. There is no way to set up any additional lighting. Lifting the shadows on the doors in post leads to very obvious pattern noise on the doors. The eventual solution is blending multiple exposures. If this had been shot with an Exmor sensor simply lifting the shadows in a single exposure would not have been a problem.

I had to go back, reprocess the image multiple times, blend exposures, apply noise reduction with debanding, apply a manual blur brush, and apply grain to even things out. Again, with a better sensor, this processing scenario would have been greatly simplified.

I will just add one more note: "ruined" is your term, not mine. And it's a loaded term. I don't think Canon images are "ruined" by not having more dynamic range. But there are circumstances where it becomes problematic.

empirical test-wise, I don't think anyone is going to argue that Canon is slightly behind Sony/Nikon in terms of dynamic range recorded by their sensors.

the argument is whether or not it's a deal-breaker. I think if the photographer is uneducated, lazy, or lacking key tools, then yes, it could be construed as a deal-breaker. but if you're really taking your work (paid work or personal artistic work) seriously, it should not present itself as any sort of impedance. people took amazing photos on slide film back in the day. I won't claim to be someone who took amazing slide film photographs, but I did use it for architectural work and I devised ways of working within its narrow dynamic range, the though process of which greatly improved the quality of my photos.

The real point is this, in actual shooting could you, not DXO, not camera labs or anyone else show in your photos that a canon cameras DR has failed you. If so, then make your point to switch immediately to nikon because canon is limiting your creativity. If you can't show so, don't complain here. We're talking real, solid photos not induced under-exposed crap but real photos.

I don't think it's hard to come up with real life scenes: I shot wildlife in the snow for the last days, and at noon I had a 600rt fill flash at manual/full power *plus* -100 highlight recovery *plus* +66 fill lights (everything above looks really bad) *plus* sometimes even tonal curve adjustments to squeeze a properly exposed scene out of the Canon raws.

Another typical scene type of are tripod night-time shots - I do bracketing anyway, but more dr = less bracketing necessary.

Yes, it all works after figuring out how to, but sometimes just barely - and problem with highlight recovery is that LR's autotone doesn't work and the shots get compressed in a non-linear way. For snow this is exactly what you want, for other highlights it often looks strange/dull and needs further post-processing wizardry.

So all in all: Yes, for my shots I would like more dr, actually as much as lower iso noise.

The real point is this, in actual shooting could you, not DXO, not camera labs or anyone else show in your photos that a canon cameras DR has failed you. If so, then make your point to switch immediately to nikon because canon is limiting your creativity. If you can't show so, don't complain here. We're talking real, solid photos not induced under-exposed crap but real photos.

I don't think it's hard to come up with real life scenes: I shot wildlife in the snow for the last days, and at noon I had a 600rt fill flash at manual/full power *plus* -100 highlight recovery *plus* +66 fill lights (everything above looks really bad) *plus* sometimes even tonal curve adjustments to squeeze a properly exposed scene out of the Canon raws.

Another typical scene type of are tripod night-time shots - I do bracketing anyway, but more dr = less bracketing necessary.

Yes, it all works after figuring out how to, but sometimes just barely - and problem with highlight recovery is that LR's autotone doesn't work and the shots get compressed in a non-linear way. For snow this is exactly what you want, for other highlights it often looks strange/dull and needs further post-processing wizardry.

So all in all: Yes, for my shots I would like more dr, actually as much as lower iso noise.

Neat, my question is why shoot mid-day? I dont know what situation you were in but afternoon light is less harsh. A d800 shot at noon will look blown out and uglier than a P&S shot done at the proper time. I've seen some stunning snow shots done on film! That's because they wait for the proper time.

Not against DR, but I come from velvia 50 slide film and that had terrible DR.

Now don't make fun of me, but I had to shoot an easter egg hunt event near 11am-noon last weekend, outside, and it was harsh. I shot with a 1Dx and 24-70L II and the RAW files cleaned up very nicely. And to think I didn't have as many stops of DR as the D800. Man what my photos could have been...

Neat, my question is why shoot mid-day? I dont know what situation you were in but afternoon light is less harsh. A d800 shot at noon will look blown out and uglier than a P&S shot done at the proper time.

I was shooting from noon till dawn, and by now I know where it gets tricky - in high contrast I need a fill flash (fill light in LR just isn't the same), and action shots (i.e. high shutter = high iso = less dr) are out of the question or it looks like a p&s.

But good :-> to hear the d800 also doesn't do it, I cannot say how big the real world advantage is at low iso - I just have one guy in mind that posted beach volleyball shots here and said the d800 really made the difference.

And to think I didn't have as many stops of DR as the D800. Man what my photos could have been...

Please do take not I'm not saying you cannot do good high contrast shots with Canon - it just takes more thought, equipment, knowledge & postprocessing and some limited scenes simply are dr-limited.

One notorious example are shots with the sun in the frame - the corona is more or less pronounced according to dr range (unless you do hdr bracketing) and/or the front shadows have more definition. Since I really like backlit nature scenes maybe I stumble across it more often than others.

Neat, my question is why shoot mid-day? I dont know what situation you were in but afternoon light is less harsh. A d800 shot at noon will look blown out and uglier than a P&S shot done at the proper time.

I was shooting from noon till dawn, and by now I know where it gets tricky - in high contrast I need a fill flash (fill light in LR just isn't the same), and action shots (i.e. high shutter = high iso = less dr) are out of the question or it looks like a p&s.

But good :-> to hear the d800 also doesn't do it, I cannot say how big the real world advantage is at low iso - I just have one guy in mind that posted beach volleyball shots here and said the d800 really made the difference.

And to think I didn't have as many stops of DR as the D800. Man what my photos could have been...

Please do take not I'm not saying you cannot do good high contrast shots with Canon - it just takes more thought, equipment, knowledge & postprocessing and some limited scenes simply are dr-limited.

One notorious example are shots with the sun in the frame - the corona is more or less pronounced according to dr range (unless you do hdr bracketing) and/or the front shadows have more definition. Since I really like backlit nature scenes maybe I stumble across it more often than others.

Me, personally, I think technology is my b*tch to be use as I see fit. If I could afford it I'd dabble across brands... The concept of using digital backs on standard bodies makes sense and allows an upgrade and scalability path. I wish I had the time/money to play with such amazing tech.

I used to kinda scoff at $9K leica users until I sued one and saw the image off of an M9 from a film lens that was like 20 years old. Really something.

However, I have to say, the images we are getting today off ANY system is surpassing anything we had just a decade ago. THATS kinda where I chose to lose myself in... between the fidelity of the image, the capture ability between the fast lenses and AF systems, and the convenience and range of the post processing ability... heck you want to talk softness.. I throw lensbabies on a 22 MP camera! I think its really the impact of what you are shooting. And you always hear people asking what did you use to shoot something with, or what software you used, as if THATS the reason why the image looks so good, not because of your eye and talent.

Well, should I call the athletic director at AU and tell him the sun won't be in the proper position to photograph the soccer match?

Just kidding. Sometimes though, you have to shoot mid day, outside, and you don't have a choice. I've had to and have never had any problems with RAW files from a 1D4, 5D3, or 1DX. You just understand how to maximize the DR that your camera is capable of doing, and do it. 14 stops vs. 11 stops will never matter if you can do that.

Well, should I call the athletic director at AU and tell him the sun won't be in the proper position to photograph the soccer match?

Just kidding. Sometimes though, you have to shoot mid day, outside, and you don't have a choice. I've had to and have never had any problems with RAW files from a 1D4, 5D3, or 1DX. You just understand how to maximize the DR that your camera is capable of doing, and do it. 14 stops vs. 11 stops will never matter if you can do that.

Sports is one thing, wildlife is another. Either of them mid-day won't be too pretty.